Operation Bravo 16
by Christie Redfield
Summary: Co-Written with David Wesker. A UBCS operative and a RPD officer team up in the chaos of Raccoon City to survive. OC Original Characters . Takes place during Resident Evil 3: Nemesis.
1. Prologue

Disclaimer: Resident Evil 3: Nemesis is © Capcom and the game's creator(s). No copyright infringement is intended whatsoever nor is any profit being made from this fanfic; i.e. it is purely non-profit.

Claimer: Bout the only thing either David and I own in this story are the characters Reese Kyleson and Ella Waverly respectively, they are our own creations created specifically for this story.

Spoilers: Resident Evil 1 & Resident Evil 3.

Feedback: Love it, live for it, cherish it.

Category: Suspense/Horror

Rating: M – For violence and language.

Author(s) Notes: Hey all, Christie here. I know sometimes stories with OC (Original Characters) have a tendency to be overlooked, but at the same time I think they can also be a refreshing change of pace if handled well. The main idea for the story was David's idea and not my own and he asked me to help write it with him, so here we are. :D Both of us have written in the past in some shape way or another but only recently did the idea to write a RE story jumped to mind. We're already thinking up some other ideas for future RE stories, including others that would involve the main characters like Chris and Jill. But for now we hope you enjoy what we cooked up.

-Christie Redfield

Operation Bravo 16

By Christie Redfield & David Wesker

**September 26th, 1998  
0630 Hours  
Raccoon City**

_"What a Hell of a time for this to happen. Just turned twenty-eight a few days ago. I was sitting in a bar with some friends celebrating. Celebrating everything. Our return from the Gulf alive. Surviving. Getting a job with one of the biggest companies around. A gig with great pay and benefits. A dream job for a twenty-eight year old Army veteran newly back in the world. _

_Now it seems like I never left. And things have only gotten worse."_

Staff Sergeant Reese Kyleson stood looking out a seventh storey window of a former office building. He had on a uniform stating that he was with the Umbrella Biohazard Countermeasure Service. Just a uniform. He had a M4A1 resting in his arms as he eyed the chaos in the streets below.

He did not have a sense of calm from being high above it. In fact, quite the contrary. He experienced a sense of gut-gnawing dread. An icy, broken glass in the gut feeling from knowing. Knowing that he had to go right down into that hellhole if he wanted to have chance of survival.

It had to be that way. There was no way you could just hole up in one spot. Not with those...those things running loose. They were ugly, uncoordinated and less than intelligent, but were frighteningly crafty. Nothing at all like they were described by Supervisor Morgan in the briefing.

It was supposed to be a sweep and clear operation. UBCS comes in with their big machines and shiny guns and saves the backwater town from some mysterious hazard. The stuff of cheap thriller novels and made-for-TV movies. Only for real. Some shooting, some lights and cameras and then out for a beer. It sure as Hell was not supposed to go like this. The rest of the squad gone. The last one, executed after being turned into one of those things. He was bitten. Bitten, died and come back to...a soulless nightmare. Fortunately brief.

Fortunately still, he had ammunition on him.

His rifle was gone, but he still had two magazines. Had a spare for the SIG, an extra knife, rations and batteries. A medkit too, for all the good it would do. All that and Kyleson still had his old 1911A1 for backup.

A car exploded outside. It was game time.

***

Detective Ella Waverly couldn't believe her luck. Little over three weeks ago she had received word that she was being transferred from her old precinct in Dayton, to the small Midwestern town of Raccoon City. They told her it would be a welcome change of pace, and that they could use her talents. She was hardly prepared for the bizarre happenings that were unfolding already in town when she arrived.

At first it seemed like a prank pulled off by a group of college kids, or some occultist group hoping to get a rise out of the local populace, but when the report volume continued growing, she was beginning to have her suspicions. That was when the reports about the wild dogs popped up, and the S.T.A.R.S. unit was off to the Arklay Mountains. When they came back the situation had increased tenfold, and the attacks grew more rampant and that was the day she got the call to arms, for any and all available units.

Waking up, it was like stumbling into a George Romero flick, or Hell even something John Carpenter would be proud of. Gathering up what few items of usage she had, consisting of a Kevlar vest, her Browning Hi-Power, ammo, paperclips, and a penlight she set out for the streets, preparing to the meet the Hell that awaited and hoping she wasn't the only human being still left with their humanity intact.

***


	2. Chapter 1

Kyleson kicked open the front door of the small office building, knocking over an undead postal worker. The soulless thing landed hard on its back, its head colliding with the street. It issued a groan as it started to rise again, only to receive a swift punting kick from Kyleson. An audible cracking sound was heard as the vertebrae in the neck were broken and separated. A final stomp directly onto the skull put the thing down for good.

"I guess it'd be inappropriate to make a joke about 'going postal'," thought Kyleson as he moved on.

The streets were crawling with the things. The undead. The zombies. Kyleson was right in the thick of it being on street level. He used cars, piles of debris and fire to remain hidden and out of sight. Turning down an alley, Reese came face to face with yet another zombie. Two of them in fact. One was dressed like a prostitute, the other a guy in a suit. The sight was disturbing on so many levels. Delivering a swift kick, Reese knocked the female zombie down to the ground. A solid right hook to the side of the head sent the male zombie down as well. Another kick, knocking the male zombie's head into the brick wall killed off the male.

The female zombie was crawling towards Reese's leg. Reese stepped back, knocking over a can full of rancid garbage onto her. The female zombie slipped in the rotten, mushy mess as she tried to stand. Reese, trying to conserve ammunition, picked up a brick and caved in her skull. The female zombie collapsed into a heap on the rancid trash. Reese checked his surroundings as he leaned up against one of the alley walls for a moment. The situation was insane and ridiculous, yet all too real. He almost wanted to laugh.

Shaking his head, Reese spotted a fire escape that was immediately accessible. He could use the high ground to get his bearings. He needed to get to a police station. He could find supplies and hopefully allies within.

***

Ella ducked down into a narrow alleyway as she came across a trio of zombies bent over a fallen body, she nearly tripped backwards over her own feet as one of the undead looked in her direction, its current attention shifted from its 'meal'.

"SHIT!" she cursed hoarsely.

Stumbling back to her feet she backpedaled into the brick wall near her and looked around for an escape, there was a dumpster situated near a fire escape. She wasn't sure how intelligent the creatures were but decided it was as good an option as any opposed to being stuck in the alleyway. Climbing up quickly she cursed when she spied that the rooftop had been blocked off with fallen debris; as she looked around more closely it appeared a gas line had exploded and taken out the upper level, and the fire had taken care of the rest.

Great, her luck navigating through the building would be akin to a house of cards, she could only pray the remaining support beams would hold the place long enough intact for her to get a safer area. Ducking down inside a window, fire and smoke greeted Ella. She'd have to move fast, moving quickly down the hallway she ducked around debris and avoided the small fires devouring the floor boards, the wood protested under her boots, which led her to further believe that maybe she'd been better chancing it with the undead.

As she crossed along further one of the boards cracked under foot and she slipped catching herself on the edge of the floor in front her. Quickly she scrambled back up and quickened her pace going to the opposite end of the hall, to a window that led outwards onto a fire escape. Below her she spotted main streets and several abandoned vehicles, she was almost there, if she could just reach the police station.

***

The fire escape rattled under Reese's boots as he quickly made his way up to the roof of the building. Apparently it was under repairs as there was a pilot of bricks, some bags of concrete mix and some tools. Grabbing the wheelbarrow by its handles, Reese moved it over to the top of the fire escape, blocking the way up. Going to the pile of concrete mix bags, Reese picked up two of them and dropped them in front of the roof-access door. A quick look around found no other ways up onto the roof.

Sitting down for a moment, Reese extracted a pair of binoculars. The city was full of smoke and debris. It was incredible how quickly things could fall apart. So much for society and all of its technological advances. Did not seem to be doing a whole Hell of a lot of good right now.

Hundreds of zombies were in the streets. That was just the ones that could be seen. Who knows how many were crawling in the buildings and alleyways. Reese set the binoculars down for a moment and pulled the map his team had been given during the briefing. The R.P.D. station closest to him was still four blocks away. Not much of a distance in a regular situation. Today, however, it may as well have been a hundred miles.

There was another point of interest on the way though. Close enough to be handy.

"A gun shop," said Kyleson to himself. "Kendo's."

Kyleson made a brisk run to the next building. The terrain was uneven with all the junk laying around. You had to watch your surroundings and your footing. Screwing up on either could get you killed. Reese dodged around the streets for several minutes, taking shortcuts whenever he could. His SIG got quite a workout. At last, he made his way up to another intact fire escape. Maybe he could catch a break.

Hitting the rooftop, Reese checked and secured the area. Picking up his binoculars again, Kyleson scanned the area. He spotted the shop after a few moments. A good point of interest, if it was still viable. Unfortunately, there was only one way to find out.

A loud clanging noise rocked Kyleson out of his thoughts. A zombie had come up the fire escape, disturbing the wheelbarrow.

"Fuck!" cursed Kyleson.

Kyleson dropped his binoculars and picked up another sack of concrete mix. Angrily, he stalked towards the shambling undead and hurled the bag. The heavy concrete mix impacted into the undead, causing it to stumble backwards. It bounced off the railing of the fire escape and fell to the sidewalk below with a sickening thud. Its neck was at an odd angle and its skull was open. There was a vile mess all around the body.

"Time to check out the toy store," said Kyleson as he made his way down.

***

As Ella made her way down the streets and neared closer to the R.P.D. still three blocks ahead of her, she could see that the carnage was getting steadily worse as she drew nearer to the station. Two SWAT vans lay overturned several yards away blocking off the street, apparently a rushed attempt to barricade the building was made but never came to fruition.

Helmets littered the ground as she approached and she sadly shook her head as she stepped past her fallen comrades. A hand reached out for her ankle and Ella screamed.

"NO!"

She jerked her foot away and broke free and trained her pistol on the zombie is it staggered to its feet and let out an unearthly moan before reaching towards her. Ella's hands shook as she spied the nametag; it was an officer she met upon her arrival to the RPD. Collins.

"Back!" she shouted at the figure.

The face behind the shattered faceguard was horribly mutated and she closed her eyes as she fired. The zombie stumbled backwards and fell, hearing no further sounds she looked down finding that target hit home. Crying she brushed a tear from eye, her wavy auburn hair falling across her face as she ducked down her head in silent mourning.

"I'm sorry, Collins."

She shook her head, no that wasn't her comrade, not anymore at least. He was already gone when he...changed? Deciding to press on, she searched the SWAT vans, and recovered some ammo and a first aid spray before she continued to move on towards the station. She could only wonder how many others had suffered the same fate as Collins.

***

The door to Kendo's was open. The windows on the front of the store were large, but fortunately heavily barred as well. Kendo was probably a nut about security. That was a good thing in most cases. Very good on a day like today.

The place was looted heavily already. It was a confirmed fact that Kendo had a contract with the local police force. He modified the weapons of their elite S.T.A.R.S. units. A few things were left, mostly .22 pistols and pellet guns. Some random shotgun shells were loose on the floor, along with bits of flesh and copious amounts of blood. Reese shook his head as he moved deeper into the store. Nobody inside.

Now if Reese was reading this Kendo correctly, chances are that he had a separate collection that was not readily available. Walking around, Kyleson saw the workshop where Kendo did his repairs and modifications. He continued walking down the hall and found an office.

The desk was a mess, papers everywhere. The top drawer was nearly yanked out. An empty holster and cardboard box were left inside. The cardboard box used to hold .45 rounds. That would have been a useful find. Nothing else useful was in the desk. Looking around the rest of the office, Reese spotted another door. It was locked with three padlocks. Kyleson shook his head. No keys were found in the desk.

"Damn it," said Kyleson as he stared at the locks.

He thought for a few moments and then snapped his fingers. Walking back to the workshop, Reese poked around through the supplies. He found a few solvent chemicals and took them back to the office. There, he applied them to the lock mounts. It was slow going, but it worked. At least after a few impacts with a fire extinguisher.

Yanking the door open, Reese saw two rifles inside. One was an old M1 Garand. The other was a Springfield M25 sniper rifle system, also known as the 'White Feather'. Named after Carlos Hathcock, a very successful Marine Corps. Sniper during Vietnam. He had had an opportunity to use one a few times in the Gulf. Taking it off the rack, he examined it. There were also a few boxes of ammunition for it which Reese put into pockets on his vest.

It was definitely time to go to the high ground again. Maybe he could thin out some opposition before he started back out for the police station.


	3. Chapter 2

Glass crunched under foot as the R.P.D. came into view, and Ella breathed a sigh of relief. At the very least here she could find some sort of haven from the chaos if it wasn't already penetrated by the undead legion. She froze as she drew nearer to the front gates and watched as someone hurried inside.

"HEY WAIT!" Ella shouted.

It was too late though the man didn't see her and had already raced inside. Ella thought she glimpsed a uniform but she couldn't be certain, as began to approach she looked up hearing a hard pounding noise coming from somewhere down the streets; whatever it was had to be big and moving very fast. Thinking quickly she dove behind a wrecked car and hid.

The pounding noise had turned into a loud stomping noise and she pressed herself further against the car as she caught glimpse of a gigantic form, much, much larger than that of a normal human, 10 feet tall at least she guessed. Definitely not human, shit. She was low on ammo. If that thing spotted her...without warning the giant vaulted over the main gates and Ella looked up as she heard screaming. She wondered what the Hell was going on. Ella took off at a full blown run towards the side entrance as an inhuman roar pierced the night sky. To Hell with sticking around!

As she ran she could have sworn she heard gunfire followed by more roaring and she nearly stopped and debated going back and shook her head. If it was that guy facing off with the creature she could only hope he was a good shot, otherwise going back to help might prove more trouble than it was worth for them both.

Ella didn't stop running until she came across an alleyway leading towards the R.P.D.'s side entrance. Dozens of crates blocked her way which she climbed over and she found herself in a miniature parking garage. Looking around frantically she spied a door and ran towards it, finding it locked upon immediate inspection. Pulling out the paperclips she had pocketed she worked at the lock hoping to pry it open. Just as she thought she had the locking mechanisms opened, the paperclip snapped and she cursed.

"Sonnuva...!"

She glanced towards the ground and spied two undead, not moving. "Well I suppose it's not all bad..." She looked up as she heard a loud pounding noise from towards from the front entrance.

"Or not."

***

Kyleson had used his new rifle to great effect. Mainly by staying high and off the main drag, he had been able to move more quickly. Sometimes it was rooftop to rooftop, other times he had to make a run for the next fire escape. The latter had led to some interesting situations. His sidearm had kept his ass out of the fire though. At least so far.

Reaching the roof of the latest building, he saw that the police station was directly across the street. Unfortunately, so was the biggest damn ugly son of a bitch that he had seen so far.

"God damn," muttered Reese as he brought up his sniper rifle.

Eyeing it through the scope, he got a better view. It was a hideously deformed, leather-clad mutant freakjob. It looked like something out of Clive Barker's rogue's gallery. Settling into a prone position, Kyleson worked on making a shot.

Having worked out the distance, windage and elevation, Reese set up to make his shot. Once he was sure, he squeezed the trigger. The rifle barked and Reese watched as the bullet impacted into the back of his target's neck, near the base of the skull. Flesh exploded and something that looked like blood oozed from the wound. The creature, however, did not even seem to notice. It continued to pound on the doors of the station for several minutes. Eventually though, it seemed to grow impatient and vanished into the darkness.

Reese used his scope to examine the area for another several minutes to make sure that the thing had indeed left and not merely hid itself. Once he was relatively certain that the mutant or any other targets were gone, the UBCS operative left his perch and headed for the station. Since the front doors were obviously barred, he made his way around to the side entrance.

***

After failing to jimmy the lock on the door, Ella decided to try looking around for keys to get inside. There was a guard station nearby, and God only knows what else, still she thought there might be other items of usage she could find, and more undead. Readying her pistol she approached the guard station and kicked the door open. An old ceiling fan spun lazily and she could smell burnt coffee mixed with the smell rotting flesh.

As she turned the corner she spotted the sight and turned away instantly and fought back the urge to vomit; a guard or rather what was left of him sat rotting slumped over his desk, maggots crawling over him. Scanning the room, she found some small maintenance lockers; these housed personal effects, like a jacket, a dog eared paperback, and a paper sandwich bag swarming over with flies. Probably the guard's last meal.

She stopped as she noticed something gleaming on the desk, a metal ring with a single key dangling on it. Jackpot. Cautiously, she approached the desk and reached for the keys, as her fingers wrapped around the ring and she tugged them away, the body slumped forward and fell at her feet and Ella quickly stepped back she breathed a sigh of relief as he made no motions to arise. She turned around and exited the guard station.

She screamed as a uniformed zombie lumbered in her direction, his companion slowly moving along beside him. Raising her gun she popped off two shots and cursed as the Browning jammed. "SHIT SHIT SHIT!" Using the butt of the pistol she swung towards the one undead's head and found herself wrestling to get the creature away as it leaned forward to try and bite her.

***

Kyleson had been moving around to the side entrance. It had been piled over with crates and the like. A couple of downed SWAT vans were in the way as well. Kyleson picked up a shotgun that was lying on the ground and checked it. Unloaded, but with five shots on the stock sling. He decided to hold onto it, opting to keep his SIG in play for the moment.

After shambling over more crates and other debris, Kyleson found himself in a small parking garage. Most likely for the higher-ups. He also heard a scream.

"SHIT! SHIT! SHIT!" came the voice. A woman's.

Moving in quickly, Kyleson stepped inside, sweeping the place as he did so. He saw two zombies moving in on a woman. She had a badge on her belt. She sent one back with a snap kick to the jaw. Kyleson sent his buddy to the grave with two 9mm rounds to the head. The woman backed off, aiming her gun at Kyleson as he came up and stomped the remaining undead to death.

With both finished off, Reese looked around. He spotted the dead guard in the small shack. He appeared to not be alive or undead. Still, Reese was not a fool. A knife through the man's skull made sure he would stay dead. Cleaning the blade off on the man's uniform, Reese turned back to the female cop. She couldn't be older than 25 he wagered, her shoulder length wavy auburn hair framed a pair of sharp blue green eyes that studied him intently. On second glance if not for the badge she could have been mistaken for a civilian given her state of dress; black jeans and a faded brown leather zip up jacket and black boots.

"Are you ok?" he asked. "Are you hurt?"

Ella lowered her weapon cautiously as the newcomer approached her, he wasn't undead, yet. But he wasn't a civilian either from the looks of his outfit. Ella speculated him to be in his early thirties at least though his dark green eyes mirrored that of a hardened soldier. His dark brown hair was a mess and soot covered his features. He had seen action recently; Ella wagered she didn't look any better herself given their current predicament. Her eyes narrowed and she eyed him warily.

"I'm fine, who are you, you don't look like a civvy," She studied the sleeves of his uniform. "Neither S.T.A.R.S. or R.P.D. either, just who are you?"

"Former Ranger. Now Umbrella Biohazard Countermeasure Service," said Kyleson as he tossed her the shotgun he found. "Reese Kyleson. You?"

"Detective Ella Waverly, I just transferred over from the Precinct in Dayton, Ohio." She caught the shotgun he tossed her after she holstered her pistol, and she thought for a second as she looked at him. "Did you say Umbrella? As in the pharmaceutical chain?"

"Yeah," said Kyleson. "We're here to help. Granted I didn't know it was like this. Hell. Damn near was a Happy Meal on the way over."

Ella looked at Kyleson, a confused expression on her face. "You say you're here to help, but you didn't know what to expect? What the Hell did they tell you then?"

"That is a good question," said Kyleson with a smile. "They said a 'hostile riot situation, possible chemical attack'. They did not exactly mention the exact details or how many we would be facing. You have a beef with Umbrella or something?"

"I've only been here a short time, but word around the station is that they're not very well liked, especially by the S.T.A.R.S. team, or what's left of them anyways."

"Not much I can do about that," said Kyleson with a shrug. "I'll just have to let my natural charm do its thing. Meantime, you best load that street howitzer. We have supplies to gather if we're to make it through this."

She laughed humorlessly. "Don't flatter yourself; do you have any shells hotshot?"

"Five on the stock there, pretty lady," said Kyleson as he reached into a pocket on his vest. "And, uh, three more here. Double-aught."

"Right," Ella loaded the shells into the gun, locking them into place.

She produced the key ring to Kyleson, "I found these, they should unlock that door over there, I tried to jimmy the lock earlier using paper clips but they broke off. Hopefully I can get the door unlocked still."

Ella stepped past Kyleson and over to the door in question. She tested the keyhole finding that a longer fragment of the paper clip had broken off and was easily removable. Withdrawing the key she inserted it into the door and turned the lock before she chucked it over her shoulder.

"Hold up," said Kyleson as he stacked up on the other side of the door. "On three. One. Two. Three."

Ella opened the door and Kyleson checked the interior before moving inside. It was a large room with chairs and a blackboard. The roll call room, most likely. Nobody to be seen.

"Clear."


	4. Chapter 3

Ella stepped inside and closed the door behind her as she took in their surroundings. "Half the entire force got called out, it'd be a miracle if there's still anyone here holding the fort." She approached the blackboard, and glanced around the area, some tables had been set up nearby, these were littered with empty snack wrappers and soda cans. Some vending machines at close by, one for snacks the other drinks, a smaller vending machine for coffee accompanied it.

She spied ply boards hammered haphazardly across the outside windows. Two doors led in and out of the room. The larger of the two doors, a double door was barricaded heavily with numerous fold up tables stacked against it. The other door was a smaller door; she could only hope it provided a means of further access.

"Not looking good," said Kyleson quietly. "I guess we'll take the smaller door. Same game plan or you want to lead the charge this time?"

Ella made her way to the smaller door, and stood near the wall and motioned for Kyleson to open it.

"After you."

"On three then," Reese said with a nod. "One. Two. Three."

Reese opened the door quickly. The room that lay before them was an office section. It was populated with cubicles.

Ella lowered her shotgun as she cleared the room. "Fucking Hell."

"I'll take point," said Kyleson as he reloaded his SIG. "Cover me." Reese also checked his .45 in holster to make sure it was ready to go. Slowly and quietly, he stalked into the room. He checked four cubicles and pulled a chair from one of them. Setting it up, he kicked it down the aisle past the other cubicles. He hoped it would stir some movement. Unfortunately, it did.

Seven zombies emerged from cubicles and side aisles. Fortunately, they all had to file down the narrow aisle between cubicles. Kyleson let fly some lead. His first shot felled two of the zombies. He kneeled as Ella came up behind him. Between them, they dropped the other five undead. It wasn't over though. Crouch-walking, Kyleson spun and pushed Ella to one side as he brought his SIG to bear on zombies that had come from behind them. Ella also spun and opened fire giving Reese time to pick up and throw a chair at the oncoming squad of four zombies. They all fell over and Ella moved to assassinate them.

Kyleson turned again, bringing the butt of his SIG into the nose and eyes of another zombie, killing it instantly. All suddenly fell quiet as the stench of cordite seeped into his nostrils.

"You got some moves on you, girl. Better than half the UBCS ops I've worked with."

Ella shrugged, "What can I say, I try."

She flipped open the shotgun and found it to be empty, and slung the empty weapon over her back.

"We should search the area; see if we can find anything of usage. Some of the detectives are stationed back here, with the newcomers to the RPD." She shrugged again, "So I've been told."

"Your house," said Kyleson as he began clearing the rest of the cubicles with his M4. "Rock it out. I'll clear here." After clearing a section, he paused. "Oh yeah, here is a radio. Took it off one of my deceased team mates. Channel 7."

Taking the offered radio, Ella attached it to her belt and switched it on. "Thanks, and I'm sorry about your comrade."

"He went out like he wanted to. That crazy S.O.B.," said Kyleson. "And I made sure he didn't walk around afterwards, as per his request."

Kyleson moved off to clear the rest of the office area.

Before Ella had a chance to respond, Kyleson had stepped away. She shook her head somberly, knowing all too well how he felt after her earlier encounter with Collins outside. He'd pretty much given her the same song and dance, and when the time came...brushing the memory aside she turned down the aisle and looked around for something of use.

She halted when she reached her cubicle; two cardboard boxes sat stacked atop each other under the desk, and the desk itself was a mess; bins overflowed with paper, accompanied by folders, mostly cases regarding recent activities prior to all Hell breaking loose. A pen cup had been knocked over, along with a picture frame, this she left untouched as she turned her attention to a metal roll up cabinet built into the cubicle wall. Locked.

Ella pushed the chair aside as she felt around the bottom desk; she grimaced when her fingers found a wad of chewing gum.

"Ick...that's not it." She fished out her penlight and ducked under the desk and shined the light upwards as she spotted Kyleson nearby. "Find anything?"

"Another friend," said Kyleson as he squeezed the trigger and sent a bullet through another zombie. "And the Captain's office."

Kyleson tried the door, but it was locked. Locked, that is, until he put his boot to it. The door gave way and Kyleson stepped in to clear the office. The only body in the room was sitting on the leather couch in front of the desk. The man had shot himself in the head. A bite wound on his forearm said that he wasn't a coward. Just unlucky.

"Think the Captain would have anything useful?"

Finding nothing under the desk still, Ella called out. "He might keep something in the safe behind his desk; I don't know the combination though." She added then, "He keeps some weird plants growing on the shelf in there though; I don't know what that's all about."

Kyleson searched the desk. It was a large, heavy oak construct. Solid all the way through. The drawers were open but yielded nothing but papers and office supplies. Kyleson checked under the desks. He found something taped under the pencil drawer. A key. Standing, he turned and took the picture off the wall that was covering the safe.

"A key-safe? Odd," said Kyleson.

Unlocking the safe, Kyleson extracted a few satin-lined boxes with medals, other files and an ornamental gun to represent his captaincy. The final thing was a keycard that had unrestricted access to other areas of the building.

"Got us an all day pass, pretty lady."

"An all day pass?"

"Captain's access card," said Kyleson. "Unrestricted access card."

"Well at least one of us found something of usefulness." Ella carefully crawled out from under her desk and stood cracking her neck as she did. "Damn it, where did I put the thing?"

"Oh, and here are your R.P.D. creds and badge," said Kyleson as he walked out of the office. "What thing?"

She banged on the cabinet that sat still locked on the side of the cubicle. "Spare key for this." She turned her attention back to her desk as she rummaged around the items.

"If I can get it open, I can find something that will be of further usage to us."

"Try this," said Kyleson as he reached into another pocket on his vest. He tossed a lock pick set to Ella. "Never was much good with it."

Ella caught the lock pick set as Kyleson tossed it to her. "So why do you have it?"

"Part of our training," said Kyleson. "Something else I borrowed off a friend."

"Fair enough. Thanks." Turning her attention back towards the cabinet, Ella used the lock pick to unlock the cabinet, and she was able to open it fairly quickly. "Never did hurt to be prepared."

Reaching inside she withdrew a first aid spray which she tossed in Kyleson's direction, before she reached in again to extract a small wooden box, accompanied by a box of ammo. She withdrew her Browning as she opened the box and she heard Kyleson approach her from behind.

"Welcoming present, from Kendo, from what the note told me, said it'd give it a little more kick, and knock down the recoil."

Kyleson stowed the first-aid spray in one of his vest pockets. He approached to see what all the fuss was about, keeping an eye on their backs as well. He checked the load in his M4 mag and reloaded it. He checked his SIG and reholstered it.

"So, what is it?"

"Modification Parts for a Browning Hi-Power."

"May as well do it now," said Kyleson as he brushed a bunch of crap off the desk. "While we have time."

"That's exactly what I'm doing, chief." She remarked as she set to work on modifying the gun, "You don't think I know what I'm doing?"

Kyleson did not answer. Instead, he moved slowly towards the far end of the office area, M4 at the ready. Peering through the small window in the door at the end of the office area. He looked out into the main lobby and saw another four undead roaming around in there. One of them had a gun in his hand.

Three more came shambling out of another hallway across the way. Kyleson ducked down and made his way back to Waverly.

"At least seven more in the lobby," said Kyleson. "One of them had a gun in hand. I wonder if he's any good with it."

Finished with her handiwork, Ella loaded the Browning and looked up as Kyleson approached. "One's armed you said?"

"Yeah," said Kyleson. "I'll take him out."

"Doubtful, they even know how to use a weapon, they're driven more by hunger than anything else." She replied as she ducked down and approached the window and peeked out through the blinds, spying the seven Kyleson had spotted earlier. "Still...it wouldn't do him much good; I threw on a Kevlar vest before I broke out my apartment.

"Once more unto the breach then," said Kyleson.

Ella opened the door as per their new tradition and Kyleson sapped the gun-toting cop zombie with a shot to the head. The one closest to him was dropped as well. Kyleson kneeled as Ella came near him and opened up.

Ella leveled her Browning, and let the stock rest under her right arm. Taking aim she popped off three shots at the closest zombie and he stumbled backwards into his friends, which allowed Ella to take aim and fire off three more rounds in their direction effectively taking the pair down. The third undead shambled towards her and she took up aim again, then without warning the zombie dropped to its knees and fell over dead.

Kyleson opened up the skull of another zombie with his SIG 9mm. He was loving the hollow point rounds that were standard issue for UBCS personnel. Standard rounds would definitely have rendered his sidearm less effective. Almost useless really. Though ammunition was at a premium to be sure. He would definitely require a restock ASAP. The final zombie got dropped like a sack of flour.

Standing, Kyleson did a brief recon of the lobby and then returned to the main desk. The cop sitting there was also dead, but Kyleson knifed him in the head to make sure. He also took his gun and set it up on the counter for Ella. He took the two spare magazines and set one next to the gun for Ella and emptied the rounds from the other to use for himself. Thankfully they were also hollow points.

"You better take this ASP baton as well," said Kyleson, setting it next to the other supplies. "See what else we can get from these guys. These monitors are still working."

Kyleson pulled the dead cop from the chair and set the body behind some plants. Taking the chair, Kyleson sat down and started flipping through the video feeds.

Ella searched the downed zombie that had been carrying a piece; it looked to be a standard issue gun given to most of the officers in the RPD. No rounds remained in the chamber. "That one zombie you were worried about, the piece he was carrying it's empty." She jerked it loose and handed it to Kyleson.

"Standard issue around here, these are." She nudged one of the other zombies over with her boot, and checked it for anything of use.

Nothing. Go figure, she thought. Standing up she retrieved the rounds that Kyleson had left for her and pocketed them, taking care to use one to reload the Browning. She picked up the hefty M9 and holstered it in her belt. The rate they were picking stuff up she was starting to feel like Ellen Ripley, getting ready to face the Queen Alien. She stuffed the mag for the Beretta in a side pocket of her jeans, and took the ASP baton, and attached it to her belt where she could easily reach it, should they run out of ammo. Hopefully it would be an item of last resort. Or not. Ella moved over to where Kyleson sat and studied the screens, of the four, one was swamped with static. Surveillance was still online at least.

She leaned over the computer terminal and started typing. "I wonder if everything else is still online..." She tapped at the keys as Kyleson studied the video feeds. "Nice to see the Security System still works."

A command prompt came up asking her to unlock the doors, and then followed by another command asking for a user ID and password. She glanced at the card taken from the Captain's office and entered the name printed on the card. Henry Mason. She swiped the card when prompted and a series of clicks could be heard from within the lobby.

"That takes care of that...huh?" Ella tapped at the keys again, "According to this someone else accessed the system recently. From another terminal."


	5. Chapter 4

Kyleson studied the cameras. Most of what he saw on the grainy footage were dead bodies. Well, hopefully dead bodies. Some of Kyleson's team had made the mistake of bypassing supposedly lifeless corpses only to get mauled. Kyleson learned after the first incident. Now any corpse he came across that still had a head attached got the knife. A bullet if it got up to protest.

Reese kept a tally of the bodies he saw. Once he had checked the feeds, he began to look through the drawers of the lobby desk. Donuts, handcuffs, pens, papers and other office supplies. The final drawer had a box filled with packets of instant coffee. Reese took those.

Ella had been poking around the computer system. She made a comment that the system had been accessed before.

"Does it say who it was?" he asked.

She nodded. "Jill Valentine, S.T.A.R.S. member. She's one of the Arklay Mountains Survivors," Ella added with a shrug, "So I've heard."

"Heard of her," said Kyleson as he stood. "They briefed us on the S.T.A.R.S. members."

Waverly looked over at Kyleson her expression growing curious, "What did they tell you?"

"Well, it was kind of odd really," said Reese as he sat on the corner of the desk. "They had survival statistics on them."

Pulling out a PDA from a pocket of his cargo pants and hit a few buttons. "Yeah, here we go. See?" Reese handed her the PDA. Listed were files on the S.T.A.R.S. team members.

"She was one of the more successful ones apparently."

Taking the PDA from Kyleson, Ella scrolled through the device's contents, growing all the more confused as she did.

"Why would Umbrella have survival statistics on the S.T.A.R.S. team members? It doesn't make any sense to me, that company is sounding even vaguer by the minute." She gave the PDA back to Kyleson. "Do you know anything else? Like about the Arklay Mountains Incident?"

"Just what I read in the papers," said Kyleson as he stowed the PDA. "That was some grim business. Maybe we would have been sent there if we were not called here." Kyleson walked off to check out another door. "We best clear this floor and then move upstairs."

Ella nodded and followed behind Kyleson, readying her Browning as she did.

"I only know about it from what I heard around the water cooler. Apparently it wasn't a particular high point of discussion around here. I heard Chief Irons all but laughed Valentine and other S.T.A.R.S. out of the park over the whole thing, like he refused to believe any of it."

She kicked the door open and swung her Browning around, and found the room to house two zombies, which she quickly took care of. The room cleared she signaled Kyleson to follow behind her.

"I never met the guy personally, all I know is he's an avid collector of these weird obscure artifacts."

Reese eyed the cells lining one wall of the booking room. Three inmates were there. All of them zombified. Thankfully, the doors were locked tight. That did not stop them from trying to get at Ella and himself though.

Tactically speaking, they were secured. Realistically speaking, they were still a possible threat. Reese walked over to the first inmate and popped him through the forehead with a 9mm. The other two followed quickly.

"Looks like nobody's safe." Ella remarked.

"I don't like leaving them upright," said Kyleson.

"Security System is still intact you know." Ella replied as she stepped past the cells. She nearly leapt out of her skin as one of the doors creaked and fell forward crashing on the floor behind her. "JESUS!"

Kyleson snapped around at the sound, pistol aimed. A cell door was on the ground, the cell empty. No immediate danger appeared to be present. Reese did wonder what had been in the cell though. Whatever it was had wrecked the door. "You ok, Detective Waverly?"

"I'm okay, just wasn't expecting that is all." She wiped her brow and sighed, "Don't even say it." She added as she turned towards a series of desks set up in the area.

"Not a word," said Kyleson as he moved up to her position.

The rest of the ground floor exploration passed without any serious incidents. The two of them eventually found themselves in the main lobby. Kyleson stared at the front doors of the station. They were cracked and bent severely. It brought back memories of that thing he had seen earlier. He hoped that they would not have to come up against that thing. At least not until they found some better firepower. Like a rocket launcher. Or a radio to call in an air strike.

"Alright, you ready for the top floor?"

Ella nodded. "Ready."

Cautiously Ella pulled the double doors at the bottom of the ramp open and peered inside finding two zombies lying in a pool of their own blood. She nudged them with her boot, checking for signs of life and found none. "Two down, looks like somebody got to em first." She stepped around the wooden divider on the opposite end of the room and pulled open the door drawing her Browning as she did.

Broken shards of glass and paper littered the floor as she walked. "Clear!"

Ella waited until she sensed Kyleson behind her and pressed onwards, she took notice of the windows that were heavily boarded up in a hurried fashion. "C'mon this way." Glass crunched underfoot as the pair continued walking, passing by a locked room as they did. "Storage Closet." She called over her shoulder at Kyleson who she could hear testing the knob. She stood by the side of the door in front of them and kicked it open, and revealed a long narrow hallway.

"Quiet, the undead must not have breached inside yet, boards are still keeping them out...for now." Ella approached two large double doors and stood by them as she signaled Kyleson to approach. "Ready?"

Kyleson nodded and Ella opened the door. Kyleson slipped into the room and checked the area. It was another meeting room, but larger and filled with chair-desk combinations, like in high school. Nobody was in the room, living or dead. Or undead.

On the blackboard was taped a large map of the city. Areas were marked off in red pencil. Apparently this was where they formulated their ill-fated battle plan. Still, the map was worthwhile intelligence. Eventually they would have to leave the station. This would tell them what areas of the city were blockaded. Once they made their escape, Kyleson would find an Umbrella base camp and report in.

Kyleson stepped up to the map and made some notations on a file in his PDA. To his left he spied a table on which were a pile of bags of trail mix and cans of soda. He stepped over there and checked the cans before opening one and drinking. He had not had anything to eat or drink for seven hours. Walking to the doors of the meeting room, Reese closed them and blocked it with a few chair-desks. He then took a chair and sat down, closing his eyes.

Ten minutes and he would be good.

***

Ella spied an abandoned hip holster draped over one of the chairs and removed her shotgun laying it on a nearby table before she then laid the M9, and her Browning down next to it. Unclipping her Badge, Ella affixed the holster around her waist and the straps around her thighs, securing her new find into place. Now she would be able to draw either gun more quickly, should she run out of ammo.

Holstering the M9 in the holster on her left, she decided to keep the Browning on hand since the shotgun was still out of ammo, and instead reaffixed her badge. She looked up at Kyleson who was resting before she glanced around the room. One of the vending machines had been left ajar and she reached inside withdrawing a candy bar. Better than nothing she supposed, the sugar would do her good and keep her energy up anyway.

Leaning against the table she sighed and closed her eyes wondering if they would get out of this hellhole alive...Taking a bite of the candy bar she glanced at the operations map.

"This looks like a real rush job, they had put together." She studied the map more closely, "I wonder if there's anything we can use from it." Yawning tiredly she sat down on the table and closed her eyes as she leaned against the wall. Ella felt drained mentally and physically, sleepily she took another bite of her candy bar before she let her eyes drift shut again hoping to find a moment's peace.

***

Kyleson continued to doze in the chair, M4 resting in his arms. His mind swam with images of how all of this came to pass.

He was dropped off by a chopper. Supervisor Gennedy Tartarus wished them luck, his mirrored sunglasses reflecting the image of apprehensive faces back at them. The squad had no intelligence on exactly what they would be facing. Just that there were hostiles and the order was to kill. It was open season and the law was on their side.

First contact was Hell. Eight carriers waiting for them as they exited through the front door of a used book store. Ramirez went down hard. Terrell wasted an entire magazine into the chest of a zombie. Hansen was the one who scored the first kill, a headshot. After that, the team learned.

Unfortunately, it was not enough. With no transportation or air support, the team's supplies were eventually damn near depleted. They got lucky and found a cop car. They got a few magazines from the trunk. Some ammunition. Some tear gas canisters. Not enough to make a difference. They all died, one by one. Terrell was pulled into a mob of the bastards and eaten alive. Kyleson had tried to help him. Even now he wondered if that shot to the face had made a difference. He was pulled apart. Screaming.

Reese woke up. His watch told him that he had been out for roughly nine minutes. The room was secure. Ella was asleep on a table. Kyleson pulled out the map of the city that he had on his PDA. It was not nearly as detailed as the one on the board. He filled in some gaps of information using the notations that he had made earlier.


	6. Chapter 5

Ella yawned tiredly as she lifted her head from up off the table, having been waken by Kyleson as he approached the board stationed near her. She stretched as she sat up, so much for sugar giving her an energy boost. Sliding off the table she neared Kyleson, "You think you know a way out of here?" Ella rubbed her neck as she studied the board, and fought back a yawn. Sleep didn't come easy round here. Too many nightmares.

"Well, this one road here is the least problematic," said Kyleson. "We just need a mode of transportation that would survive it."

Kyleson ticked at a few buttons on his PDA. He was not crazy about going back out there, but they could not hang out forever. That and he had more than a few questions to ask Supervisor Tartarus. This whole situation was out of control before his team had even arrived. In fact, there was no way that a few squads of trained security operatives could dispatch an entire city full of lunatics. Especially without air support.

"There's a heli-pad nearby if I remember right, we can access it using the emergency tunnel. It's better than nothing." She gestured to the map, should be able to reach it if we continue out down this hall."

"That is at the sub-station," said Kyleson. "Down the road. Do you think there is even a heli still there?"

"We'll find out when we get there, now won't we? Besides it beats, staying cooped up here, the barricades won't hold forever once the undead army reaches here, c'mon lets go." Ella moved to the double doors and began pushing away the chair-desks with Kyleson's aid. Once they had finished she peered out into the hallway as Reese stood at the ready behind her.

"It's all clear."

The two stepped out into the hall and turned round a small corner, which housed a single door and a ventilation duct that was still covered. Stepping forward Ella's hand reached for the doorknob and the pair jumped backwards guns drawn at the ready upon hearing what sounded like a window being shattered followed by a loud thumping noise. The two exchanged glances and eyed the door warily before nodding and reapproached cautiously.

A loud roar could be heard followed by what sounded akin to an animal growl attempting vocality. The next thing that followed sent both Ella and Reese diving to the floor as a massive explosion rocked the halls outside causing a cloud of dust to fall from the ceiling, accompanied by...gunfire? Whoever was firing was packing heat, a magnum maybe? More roaring could be heard followed by stomping noises as they heard a door slam shut, then accompanied by faster pounding footsteps. The noises slowly grew distant and Ella looked at Reese bewildered before rising to their feet.

Cautiously, Ella grasped the doorknob and nodded at Kyleson as he stood at the ready before the pair ducked inside. Empty. Lowering her pistol the two looked around at their surroundings. Whatever just happened, it looked a miniature war zone had erupted.

"Holy shit." Ella spied that one of the windows had been busted open severely and exposed the balcony outside. "The Hell was that?"

"Damned if I know," said Kyleson. "Whatever it was, it's not here now. Let's move."

Ella moved towards the demolished window, kicking away the larger fragments of glass that remained in the frame before she hopped over it and onto the balcony. She signaled for Reese to follow her.

"Come on this way. There should be a maintenance area close by; it'll lead us to the substation." A cold wind blew outside as the pair walked on the dimly lit balcony. Further up perched high in the trees across the street, a group of about twenty to thirty crows eyed the pair intently.

"No sense in getting them started," said Reese. "As long as they stay put."

Nodding, Ella pressed on. Quietly and quickly they moved further down the balcony until they came across a rusted steel door. It was situated in a small alcove, nearly hidden from the view. Ella stood to the side as Reese opened the door. It creaked open and the pair peered inside. There was a set of stairs that led downward into a darkly lit corridor. Reese nodded at Ella and slipped in first. As the pair reached the end of the steps, they could hear barking from somewhere close by. They were near the kennels.

"Dogs, the kennels are close by here; do you think they're infected as well?" She questioned worriedly as she held her pistol at the ready.

"I hope no...," started Reese. He was cut off by a door banging open.

A series of growls let them know they were spotted. Twelve former Dobermans.

"Shit," finished Reese.

The wild, hideously mangled pack of dogs started forward. Their nails clicking on the cheap tiles of the floor. Saliva spewed thickly from their gaping maws. Reese and Ella opened fire. The dogs yelped and squished under the hail of lead, some of them still pressing forward. Reese let out a raging yell as he sliced through two advancing dogs.

Kyleson's M4 Carbine pumped round after round into the advancing pack. The degraded state of their enemy did help slightly. Waverly's mix of shotgun shells and 9mm rounds threw a deadly cocktail into the mix.

Between the two of them, the pack of rabid, infected fell away. The hallway was a grisly sight to behold. Semi-coagulated blood, bits of organs, saliva with the texture of hot glue and other bodily fluids were sloshed all over the formerly clean off-white walls and floor. A tooth fell from the ceiling and bounced off Reese's shoulder. Their ears were ringing from the noise. It was hard to maintain balance between the gore and the amount of shell casings on the floor.

"Are you ok?" yelled Kyleson through the ringing, his hand on Waverly's shoulder.

Waverly nodded, as she paused to clutch her forehead. "I'm fine!" She shouted out, her hearing was still on the fritz even after the fight. She shook her head wishing she had chewing gum so she could pop her ears. Even still they were alive.

Kyleson simply nodded and slipped down the wall to a sitting position beside her. His head was ringing. The air was thick with stench and lack of ventilation. He took a few minutes to gather himself before standing. They had to get out of this hallway. They needed air and they needed to press forward.

Kyleson started moving off down the corridor towards the emergency exit. There they would find another hallway that connected to the sub-station access tunnel. There, supposedly, was a helipad with a helicopter waiting. Hopefully. A chopper would be very beneficial at this time. They could get over the bullshit and fly their way out of town.

Kyleson paused at a door that was labeled 'Secondary Armory'. The door was locked with a keypad, four digit code. Reese stared at it for a few moments. He turned and walked back to a computer console and entered the keycard pass code to open the system. A few seconds of searching got him the file with the building pass codes.

"9304," said Kyleson.

Heading back to the hallway, Kyleson punched in the numbers on the keypad and the door opened. Inside were three M-16 rifles, two shotguns, six Beretta M9s, a M79 grenade launcher with tear gas canisters, helmets, vests and assorted ammunition.

"Hello, hot stuff," said Kyleson as he extracted a couple rifle magazines.

Taking only what was needed Ella extracted some shells for the shotgun along with some ammo for the Berretta. She picked up the grenade launcher as though mulling over the decision of taking it along, and she decided to fold up the stock for the Browning and holstered it on her right hip holster before finally taking the M79, and the tear gas canisters. "Better than nothing." She looked back over at Kyleson who was loading up with gear of his own.

"You about ready?"

"Let's get to the chopper," said Reese as he slapped in a reloaded magazine.

"Roger." The two exited the room once they had been fitted with their new gear, and made their way to the door that would lead them to the access tunnel. Upon entrance they were greeted by four zombies, two of them wielding fire axes.

"Hello!"

Ella quickly withdrew her ASP baton to catch the falling fire axe the first zombie had used to swing at her with before she popped a round off with her M9 and quickly disposed of the undead. The moment she looked up, she spied another lurching towards, quite quickly and using the baton she managed to fend the zombie off and push the undead away before following up with the M9.

Kyleson stalked up to the ax-wielding zombie. It raised the ax up over its head quite quickly. More quickly than Kyleson had seen before. Not quickly enough though. Kyleson jammed his rifle butt into the offender's face, knocking him back. The second zombie got the same treatment. Both of them were shot as they attempted to rise.

Once their ears stopped ringing from the noise, Kyleson spoke.

"So they're slow, but depending on the condition of the body, they can be pretty damn quick," said Kyleson. "I wouldn't be surprised if someone like a fireman or a cop zombie could run. At least for a bit."

Kyleson picked up the ax from the downed zombie. It was a simple tool, but it could prove useful. Kyleson let the M4 dangle and drew his SIG, using the ax in his left hand. A sign just down the hall indicated that the helipad was down there and to the left.

"If we've run out of welcoming committee maybe we can hit the helipad," remarked Kyleson.

"Good idea." The pair jogged in the direction of the helipad and raced up and outside. The cool, fresh night air rushed over them accompanied by the smell of smoke.

Ella looked around and breathed a sigh of relief spying a rescue chopper and ran towards it, while Kyleson followed behind her keeping an eye out for any more zombies. Ella climbed inside and looked around for keys, when she found none she prepared to hotwire the ignition but paused as she noticed a small tray, opening it revealed a set of keys and Ella smiled withdrawing them.

"We're good to go here."


	7. Chapter 6

"Why does this seem too easy?" asked Kyleson aloud.

He checked the rear of the chopper and did not find anyone. Slipping into the cockpit with Ella he studied the controls. It seemed way too fortunate to actually find a helicopter left in a city collapsing onto itself in chaos. Of course, everything could have happened at such a rapid rate that the chopper simply was never activated.

That scenario then led back to his wanting to question his superiors. Why send small squads of highly-trained but lightly armed operatives into a cesspool like this. There was absolutely no possibility of success. Forty men with automatic weapons could not take on a city. Even if you factored in local police and National Guard, the odds were still far off.

Kyleson knew that Umbrella had the CDC quarantine the area. There was no help coming in.

Then the thought hit Reese. What if nobody would be allowed to leave? Well that was just idiotic. In most any situation of this nature, there were survivors. Still, he had to wonder. He found himself tapping a pen on the flight controls in front of him.

***

"Reese what's wrong?" Ella asked as she strapped herself, and eyed her companion worriedly. "Let's go!"

***

"Just thinking," said Kyleson as he started up the chopper. He was amazed that it was actually in working order.

Once the chopper was online and ready to go, Kyleson made sure they were both strapped in. Once everything was set, he moved to take off. Within a few moments, they were airborne. The ground fell away from them rapidly. Buildings, fires and, most importantly, the zombies became smaller and more distant. Maybe they were going to survive this shit after all.

With Ella working the flight charts, they began to make their flight out of town. Fortunately, all air traffic was cleared in the city. Well, most of all the air traffic.

Ten minutes into their flight, another helicopter appeared. It was painted entirely in black with dark blue tinted cockpit glass. Kyleson cursed under his breath. He was not entirely sure, but the look of the new aircraft fit with some of the stories that he had been told. If it was what he believed, things were about to go real bad, real fast.

"Aw, shit," said Kyleson.

A streak of smoke suddenly left the other helicopter and then an explosion rocked Kyleson and Waverly's world. A second explosion took out everything. Controls, electronics, everything.

The chopper began a rapid descent. All Kyleson could do was stare and grit his teeth. Better to go out like this than bitten and come back as one of...them. Fuck.

The helicopter smashed through a glass ceiling and plunged into the deep end of an Olympic-sized swimming pool at the Raccoon Lodge. An exclusive in-city resort, for those that could afford it. Water exploded the already broken windows of the disabled vehicle. The cockpit was flooding rapidly and Kyleson was struggling to regain his wits. He pulled his knife as he looked over at Waverly. She was out.

Kyleson cut himself free and then cut her belt. The door on her side was missing, so that was a stroke of luck for their side. Pushing her out, Kyleson took her to the surface and saw that they had landed in a pool. Nobody appeared to be around, so he took her to the pool access area and gave her mouth to mouth. She sputtered to life and gasped before coughing up pool water.

Seeing that she was alive, Kyleson rechecked the area before diving back into the pool to extract any of their gear that he could. Oil and gasoline had spread into the chlorinated water and made it difficult to see. That was when things got bad. As Kyleson went into the back of the helicopter to retrieve their gear, he felt a hand on his ankle, instantly causing him to jerk. He turned and saw what looked like a fifty or so year old man in swim trunks coming at him. He had a bite missing from his stomach area.

The old man launched at Kyleson. Kyleson moved to attack when suddenly he felt another hand grabbed his arm. He turned to look and saw another old man in swim trunks, blood on his teeth. Kyleson slammed a boot into the face of the first old man in the red trunks, knocking him away. The second one in the green trunks, Kyleson grabbed his arm with his other hand and pulled the zombie face first into the side of the chopper.

Grabbing the gear, Kyleson escaped the chopper. Using the duffel bag as a shield, Kyleson blocked his attackers as he frantically made his way to the steps of the pool.

"Fuck. Fuck. Fuck!!!" thought Reese.

As Reese moved backwards, a pool net suddenly enveloped the head of red trunk zombie. Reese took advantage and swung a boot into the face of green trunks, double-timing it out of the pool. Ella threw the pool cleaner into the pool. Reese set the recovered gear onto a pool chair.

"Swimming with sharks," said Ella with a slight smirk.

"Oh, they're lawyers?" asked Reese, drawing his SIG.

As the zombies exited the pool, they were shot. Reese distributed their gear.

"We better go," said Reese. They'll be after us."

Ella sighed as she wrung out her damp hair, her auburn hair now a dark crimson red. "Goddammit, now I smell like chlorine, smoke, and death. The minute we get near real civilization I'm hitting the showers." She checked her gear as she took in their surroundings; it was a pretty big lodge. Many big wigs likely stayed here.

She cast a glance at the gleaming marble floors and spied a baby grand in the corner near the bar. Definitely big wigs stayed here. Her brow furrowed when she recalled Kyleson's remark and she turned his way.

"Who's coming?"

"The Cleaner squad," said Kyleson as he marched towards an exit door.

"Cleaner squad?" asked Ella as she raced to catch up with Kyleson as he neared the exit door. "The Hell's a Cleaner Squad?"

Kyleson stopped as he examined what lay beyond the door through the small window. How could he explain it? It was something that he had only heard about. Damn.

"Long story short, Umbrella has elite units that they send in...To 'clean up'. Hence the name," said Kyleson abruptly.

Kyleson's statement did little to comfort Ella. "Why doesn't that make me feel any better?" She looked around nervously, "So...what now?"

"We move or we die," said Kyleson, his voice suddenly more angry. "Both of us are dead if they find us. I need you to trust me on this."

Ella was scared, but she had a strong feeling she could trust Kyleson. They had only known each other a short while, but he had watched her back. Pulled her from the pool and saved her life. Any other person would have likely abandoned her the minute they caught sight of the zombies nearby, Hell, if she hadn't been strapped in, she would have fallen into the deep end and wound up as fish food by now.

Ella nodded grimly. "I trust you."

Kyleson spotted movement through the small window of the door leading to the dining hall. Black-clad figures with what appeared to be MP5SDs. The lights in the dining area went out. They had found them. It was too late to run.

"We're against the wall, darlin'," said Kyleson quietly. "Shit. Give me that grenade launcher."

Kyleson broke the window on the door with the butt of his rifle and let it dangle. Taking the grenade launcher, Kyleson loaded it. Several small impacts struck the heavy door. Kyleson chuckled slightly. Those rich guys did not want any cheaply made stuff in their club. All that money went for something useful at least.

Sticking the grenade launcher through the window, Kyleson fired a tear gas grenade into the dining room. He quickly reloaded and fired another after it. A loud clang behind them caused Ella to turn around. The door off her side of the helicopter had fallen from the broken ceiling and landed on the marble floor.

Just as Ella breathed a sigh of relief, four dark-clad figures rappelled down through the now open ceiling.

"You can't be serious! Shit!"

Ella drew her shotgun and aimed skywards, popping off rounds as she raced towards the bar for cover. She managed to drop one of Cleaners, but now the other three were hightailing it straight for her and Reese. The pair barely had time to react as they ducked down behind the bar and bullets tore into the front of it.

The whole scene was giving Waverly the impression they were in a full-out war zone. She glanced over at Kyleson as she covered her head, shielding her from falling glass and mirror shards that rained down upon them both.

Kyleson raised his SIG over the bar and blind-fired six shots. He heard a muffled gurgling noise and saw some weird smoke or mist. Taking a quick glance around the bar, Reese saw two of the Trashsweepers or Cleaners seemingly...dissolving. A couple rounds struck the bar near Reese's face, sending bits of wood into his face.

Ella stood up quickly and fired over the bar, three quick shots. The last of the four that had come through the ceiling was...dead.

Now they just had the ones coming through the door. Reese responded by firing a tear gas grenade right at the lead Cleaner. It struck him in the chest and exploded.

Ella quickly turned and fired three shots at the Cleaner that had struck by the tear gas grenade. In shock she watched as the figure transformed into a cloud of mist and seemingly evaporated. Momentarily caught off guard, she spied another Cleaner fast approaching her and she quickly dove to the side to avoid gunfire as he fired off in her direction.

A bullet caught her in the shoulder and then in the right thigh causing her to cry out loudly in pain. She nearly dropped the shotgun as she fell onto her back, but persisted and aimed in the direction of her pursuer. The shotgun clicked empty and she cursed. She reached for the M9 as the Cleaner leapt towards her.

Kyleson popped off two shots through the doorway as the Cleaners moved inside. He took out the second one through the door, the first one dying by Waverly's hand. A third dive-rolled inside, making it in under fire. He directed his attacks towards Ella as a fourth came in after Kyleson himself.

Cursing loudly, Reese emptied his SIG at his attacker and brought up his .45. The six rounds expended into the fourth attacker rendered the Cleaner inert. Kyleson turned to focus on the third Cleaner of the dining hall squad. Waverly was hit and reeling. Kyleson got to a crouching position and dove in front of Ella, firing his .45 twice before he exhaled as he impacted onto the marble.

His shots had made the Cleaner duck and his next two shots impacted into the enemy's chest, killing him.

Pushing herself up off the floor Ella crawled over to Kyleson as she clutched her shoulder; forcing herself to a stand she slipped catching herself on his shoulder.

"Ah shit, that bastard got me good." Breathing heavily she looked Reese over for injuries. "You okay?"

Reese grunted as he tried to move. "Dislocated my arm. Might have a broken rib."

Turning over onto his side, Reese checked his vest. Four flattened rounds within a two-inch grouping were set deep into the vest. His breathing was labored, he had a broken rib. He cursed to himself. It would keep. They had to get moving.


	8. Chapter 7

"C'mon, let's get you patched up," said Kyleson.

He moved to stand and helped Waverly up. They had to get somewhere they could defend. Somewhere where they could work things out for a few minutes. Before they left the bar, Reese grabbed a bottle of whiskey.

Off the pool area was a locker room and shower area. The locker room had a large medical kit mounted on the wall. Kyleson lay Waverly down on a bench and then went to the doorway. Bracing himself, Kyleson slammed his dislocated shoulder against the doorjamb, twice. The second time it snapped fully back into place.

"Ok, now for you Detective," said Kyleson, taking the kit off the wall.

Ella pushed herself up so that she was sitting on the bench, grimacing she unzipped her brown leather jacket and carefully pulled it off with Kyleson's aid. She cursed when she saw that the bullet had clipped past the edge of the Kevlar vest she wore.

"Figures."

Kyleson also removed the vest from Ella before he set about his operation. He extracted a scalpel from the kit and poured some whiskey on it. Using some matches from his own kit, he lit the alcohol and let it burn for a few seconds. Shaking it out, he offered the bottle of whiskey to Ella.

"It's not going to be pretty," he said.

Taking a long pull on the whiskey bottle Ella handed what was left of it back to Kyleson. She pulled her badge off the side of her belt and turned her head as she proceeded to place it between her teeth.

"Just do what you have to."

Kyleson took the bottle and poured some onto the wound causing Ella to flinch. He then cut the wound open slightly more and used a sterilized pair of tweezers to pull out the round. It was a standard 9mm round, fortunately. Kyleson tweezed it out and dropped it into a paper cup from a nearby water cooler. Pouring a little more whiskey on the wound, Kyleson swabbed it as clean as he could.

Taking a stitch kit, Reese sewed up the wound and put a bandage on. He wrapped her shoulder in gauze. "Now let's see that leg."

Nodding grimly she let Reese help her sit up. Holding his shoulder for support she swung her legs over the side of the bench and stood up carefully removing the holster attachment, before she dragged down her jeans low enough to get better access to the wound, unfortunately it also hurt like Hell. Grimacing she laid back down on the bench, and nodded to Reese as she put her badge back between her teeth and bit down on it.

"Some extra scarring here," said Kyleson as he checked the wound. "Well, this one was a through-and-through. No excessive bleeding. You got lucky." Kyleson disinfected the wound and patched her up.

After helping her redress, he sat on the bench and took a pull off the bottle.

Breathing a sigh of relief Ella set the badge down on her leg and closed her eyes. "How are your wounds?"

"I'll live," said Kyleson. "Considering the situation, I guess that's not a good thing." He went to laugh, but cringed. He took a second, longer hit off the whiskey bottle. "We'll rest for a few and then blow this joint. Maybe we can find a decent set of wheels in the parking lot here."

"You think we're safe in here? From those things?" She questioned worriedly as she sat up slightly to look in his direction.

"We killed eight of them," started Kyleson. "There should be only two others left. The pilot and the Cleaner unit commander. More than likely they are getting help. Or coming to kill us. Or both." As Kyleson set down the bottle, he heard footsteps. Quiet footsteps on the marble outside. Grabbing up his M4, Kyleson prepared himself.

Another black-clad figure came into view as Reese moved to a different part of the locker room. Their attacker was devious and apparently thought he had the advantage of surprise. Reese let loose some lead from his rifle, shattering the skull of the man, sending red blood and brain matter across the white tiled walls.

A second set of footsteps went running away, but Reese collapsed to the ground.

"Reese?!" Waverly called out in a harsh whisper. Cursing she sat back up fully and got up off the bench and searched for her companion. She quickened her steps when she saw him collapsed on the ground. Kneeling over him she shook his arm.

"Hey, hey wake up!"

She heard him murmur something incoherently and then looked up as she saw a shadow darting away, apparently this Cleaner was scared.

She shifted her attention back to Kyleson and cradled his form as she pressed her fingers against his neck for a pulse. He was still alive, and it was then she noticed the bloody mark on his chest, touching a hand to it prompted a sharp wincing from him.

"You're bleeding; let me take care of your wound." As she went to stand up she felt him tug on her sleeve.

"Go...after," said Kyleson, straining. He used his anger to get his words out. "Kill. Him. He'll...call. Use chopper...to kill. Us!! Go...!"

She grasped his hand tightly, "Stay with me, I'm coming back for you, just hold on!"

Ella stood back up and collected her shotgun, racing out towards the directions of the footsteps. She loaded up the gun as she followed the footsteps back towards the kitchen area. The clattering of pots and pans could be heard and she found herself rolling to the ground for cover as the Cleaner fired in her direction.

Ella turned and spied a container of cooking oil which she threw on the ground, before she fired at a gas canister under the stove and turned the room into an instant furnace. From somewhere in the back she heard a garbled scream and she just barely caught the sight of a misty form as it vanished in the flames.

"Try dodging that, freak."

Exiting the kitchen Ella ran back towards the locker room and stepped inside.

"REESE?!"

Reese, in the meantime, had pulled off his bulletproof vest and set it aside. He had been clipped by a bullet that had penetrated the vest and glanced off a rib. He definitely felt that one. Unfortunately, he could not see to operate without sitting up. Sitting up increased his pain and made it harder to get at the wound. A solid catch twenty-two. So he lay there and took another hit off the whiskey before pouring a bit onto the wound.

He heard gunfire being exchanged and what sounded like a small explosion. He wished that he could be there to help Ella out. Trashsweepers were supposed to be hard customers. Still, he got the guy that tagged him. Hopefully she found and killed the last one before they called in.

As Reese prepared to take another sip of alcohol, he heard footsteps. He raised his .45 in preparation.

"REESE?!" came a voice as the figure turned the corner into view.

It was Waverly. Good, she didn't die. Reese lay back.

"Now if you could just get this bullet out of me," said Reese. "Then we can go and see about stealing their ride and bugging out."

Ella ran over to Reese's side, stopping to pick up the First Aid Kit as she did and knelt down beside him laying the shotgun on the floor. "I got the other Cleaner; they won't be bothering us anytime soon."

Turning her attention back to his wound she pulled his shirt back to get a better look at the injury.

"The bullet's still inside, I'll have to pull it out with tweezers and stitch it up or you'll risk bleeding out."

"Just no fun otherwise," chuckled Reese.

Using the last of the whiskey Ella poured it over the wound before she used it to disinfect the tweezers again, using the same method Reese had earlier with the matches, thinking better of it, she did the same to the scalpel.

"I'm sorry about this." Carefully she used the scalpel to part the wound and then used the tweezers to dig out the bullet, it was buried deep and she worked as quickly as she could to extract it and lessen the pain for Reese. Once she had removed the bullet she grabbed a Styptic from the Kit and used it to stop the bleeding, and then stitched up the wound. Finished, she used one of the First Aid Sprays over the area since no antibiotic was on hand and she taped the stitched area over with gauze.

"There, be careful you don't reopen the stitches or you'll risk bleeding out again, but I think you'll be alright."

Reese nodded. Ella looked at him. He felt a question forming.

"Now what do we do? Isn't anyone from Umbrella searching for survivors? And what of your team? I mean they are searching for you, aren't they?"

"To Hell with them," Reese replied through gritted teeth. "I think Umbrella is a bad idea. They would probably shoot me on sight if I tried to hook up with them again."

"What? You can't be serious? Why the Hell would they want to kill members of their own organization?"

"I wish I knew. I think I am out of a job."

Ella laughed humorlessly, "That makes two of us, maybe I should have moved to Harvardville...what are you going to do now?"

"I'll figure something out later," said Reese. "Maybe S.T.A.R.S. will be hiring?"

Waverly looked down at the ground shook her head grimly.

"I think the S.T.A.R.S. are officially finished, it'd be a miracle if any of them are still alive. All I know is the entire squad of Bravo Team was annihilated save for one member. Who knows if any of the Alpha Team even got out of here alive before they turned into one of those undead monsters."

She shuddered thinking back on the monstrosity that she spied hulking outside the R.P.D., pitying anyone who encountered it. Zombies were one thing, but that? It'd be a miracle if someone could outrun that behemoth, let alone take it down.

She wondered if it was the same creature responsible for caving the front doors of the R.P.D. in. Was it also responsible for the destruction of the hall? They were damned lucky they never encountered it head on. Those Cleaners nearly killed both of them just minutes earlier, an encounter with that creature meant sure death.

With his ribs wrapped up, Reese slowly slipped his vest back on. He cut off the Umbrella logo and tossed it into the pool as they made their way out. The dining hall was a wreck and a fire was breaking out from the kitchen area. Neither one of them gave a damn though.


	9. Epilogue

**September 27th, 1998  
0637 Hours  
Raccoon City**

As they walked outside they were greeted with the sight of a large black helicopter sitting in the parking lot next to a few BMWs and a Porsche. Kyleson disabled the GPS device on the chopper as Ella got their new ride fired up. Once all that needed to be done was completed, Kyleson took the controls. Within minutes they were in the air and flying out of Raccoon City.

Ella glanced down as the city below them disappeared from sight slowly as the helicopter took towards the horizon, she shook her head as she watched, Raccoon City was a lost cause. She could only wonder if anyone else managed to escape alive...Ella felt sorry for anyone still trapped down there and hoped they fared a chance. She lowered her head as she sighed forlornly.

Reese Kyleson had his eyes on the gauges before him. Most specifically the fuel and oil pressure gauges. He was amazed that he and Waverly had rolled the dice and not gotten box cars. He was glad to be alive. He had fought so hard against so many different situations. He had lost so much. Finding Ella and surmounting the forces set against them brought him some measure of release. Redemption. He had beaten Umbrella. He had found and gotten a survivor out.

"Three weeks...gone...everything I own." Ella laughed in spite of her own misfortune. "I never really got the chance to unpack, now it's all gone just like that, so much for a career change."

"Not to put your issues in the back seat, darlin'," started Kyleson. "I'm there in the cardboard box under the bridge with you." He knew he could never go back to his place. For one, it was in Raccoon. The second reason being he would probably be assassinated. He could only hope that he was assumed lost. His PDA was lost in the pool. As far as he knew, that was all they had to track him.

"So what do we now? Those things, they can't track us can they?" Waverly asked looking back at Kyleson. Her thoughts grew distant as she wondered what the future held in store for the both of them; would Umbrella come and hunt them down? Kyleson looked at her, his expression a mixture of grim resolve and uncertainty.

***

Author(s) Notes: The end, or is it? Hope you all enjoyed and thanks again for reading! :)

-Christie Redfield


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